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I teach beginners to do koshinage all the time. I load them up, walk around with them, and let them down extremely gently. I do it a lot when teaching that technique so they get the idea that lining up your structure is more important than the uke going splat.

Let's face it. There is a lot of aikido out there that rush through the beginning and middle of techniques just to get the big dramatic/ego-satisfying ending. Koshinage tends to engender that issue to a more hyperbolic degree which works against the more desireable goal of unification with both people add to the overall movement.

My opinion of koshinage is that there are 2 spirals at work going on at the same time. One of the spirals is going parallel to the floor around nage, and the other is going perpendicular to the floor (up near nage, out and over and down uke, and back up nage).

The first toruble is getting the unification happening to some degree.

The next trouble with beginners is getting them to stand with enough basic structure to support someone else on their hip (assuming they are not going to master the 2 spirals right away).

The last trouble with many aikidoka is to get them to not completely finish spiral 1 before starting spiral 2. You have to be able to walk AND chew gum at the same time.

Really, these issues are the main issue with most of what I see being practiced at the "ha" level of aikido. Koshinage just makes it a bit more obvious.

There are some koshinages I avoid teaching. There is 1 in particular that when I take ukemi I find myself having to change how I'm holding on to nage 3 times to stay safe. I can't teach that safely to someone who doesn't have pretty good body skills built up. I also avoid teaching shihonage koshinage as I have never been able to determine any real value in it at all. Shihonage is interesting enough; why add extra danger for new people for lessons they could have gotten much more safely from other throws...

Yes, Peter, but in ippon seionage nage controls the arm, and forces uke around in a "safe" spin. In many aikido koshinage, nage don't control "that" arm and uke has to make sure it's out-of-the-way and not between the mat and ukes weight.

Then you start with the ones that allows you to control uke all the way

On a serious note: If teaching beginners ukemi for koshinage, I usually start with throwing them in an "O Goshi"- like hipthrow and after that let them take ukemi for regular koshinage.

Koshinage (hip throw) allows you turn your opponent while pulling him onto his hips then straightens his knees and throws him over onto his back.

A powerful technique with some many variations that can be applied. Perhaps one of the more aggressive techniques that is not practiced a lot in most Aikido dojos. I came across this interesting video showing variations. How often do you practice this technique in your dojo? Do you use the many variations?

Our dojo doesn't do it very often, and I don't think it appears on any tests until second kyu or higher (Thank God).

As a technique, I don't like it because it assumes your attacker isn't significantly bigger than you, yet there's no way you could do it in that situation. You'd have to use something else. From a training perspective, I think it's not basic in Aikido for the simple reason that you will be hitting the mat dozens of times during the class anyway, and doing it from a high fall for the better part of an hour would be hard on anybody. It's one thing to be thrown to the mat and then grapple; it's another to be thrown that way fifty times in a row.

Makes me glad I've never been tested, because I don't like it. And given that I'm a little heavier than most in the dojo, they're probably glad I don't like it!

As a technique, I don't like it because it assumes your attacker isn't significantly bigger than you

How so? Do you mean taller or heavier?

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yet there's no way you could do it in that situation

Do you mean there's no way you could do it if they _are_ near your size or if they aren't?

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From a training perspective, I think it's not basic in Aikido for the simple reason that you will be hitting the mat dozens of times during the class anyway, and doing it from a high fall for the better part of an hour would be hard on anybody. It's one thing to be thrown to the mat and then grapple; it's another to be thrown that way fifty times in a row.

I think it partly just depends who's throwing you as well as on your own falls. I am finding the more I practice the fall the less uncomfortable it's gradually getting to be. I think it was one of my least favourite falls at first, though.

I've been working on koshinage lately and I think I mainly just like it 'cause it's so fun to do...

Mostly heavier. There seem to be some things in Aikido that assume you and your partner are about the same size. The back stretch is one of them. Koshi Nage seems to be the other one. If the other person is too heavy, it wouldn't be a good first choice.

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Do you mean there's no way you could do it if they _are_ near your size or if they aren't?

Aren't.

Having said that, IIRC, Best Aikido 2 shows some koshi nages as variations of other techniques. So I suppose if you're on your way to doing one thing and get stuck or miscalculate, you have to run with what you can do, and koshi nage might be one of them. But I still don't like it.

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I think it partly just depends who's throwing you as well as on your own falls. I am finding the more I practice the fall the less uncomfortable it's gradually getting to be. I think it was one of my least favourite falls at first, though.

I've been working on koshinage lately and I think I mainly just like it 'cause it's so fun to do...

I've stopped doing the back stretch because even when I do it the liftee side properly, I keep crunching my partners. I'm just a lot heavier than most of the people I train with. I see the same problem with koshi nage. Of course, it's on some of the upper tests, so I can't avoid it forever. But I'll have to lose weight and/or improve my ukemi radically --- and it needs work already -- to get there.